TUI Crystal Ski : some HB hotels only 6 nights evening meals

A snowHead

Just noticed on Crystal Ski that a couple of the half board hotels in Zell am See only have six nights of evening meals instead of seven. One on the Sunday and another on Tuesday. Not the arrival day which can be a bit late and would be more understandable.

A snowHead

Not sure it's that unusual. Some places like to give staff a break. And remember you might be arriving late after flying but a guest who has driven down from Southern Germany might like to eat on arrival day.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

@HutToHut, shouldn’t you be staying in refuges?

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@Dave of the Marmottes, only ever seen it before in French chalets. Never in an Austrian HB hotel.

@under a new name, hut as in mountain cafe/hütte. Should be CafToCaf really!

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Of course I wouldn't rule out that TUI are managing the headline price by opting guests out of "gala dinner" night or somesuch. Shrinkflation is a real thing and most people will probably not really notice or welcome the opportunity for a meal out.

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I would expect half-board to be just that, not 6 nights chalet-board, with a meal out on staff night off. Surely hotels are staffed 7 days a week?

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@Hells Bells, maybe the hotel is staffed by Crystal employees - a 'chalet hotel'? I stayed at one at Alpe D;Huez, once, and it worked like that, IIRC.

After all it is free

The couple of Austrian ones I noticed were not Crystal staffed 'chalet hotels'. Dave of the Marmottes may be on to something with cutting out the 'gala dinner' night to lower the headline price. How that conforms with the Austrian National Hotel Regs I don't know. (When those regs applied, if you informed the hotel you'd not be able to take a meal they would be obliged to either give you a packed meal or a refund/discount.)

I have Zell on my list for next year and have been checking Crystal website and the town in general.

I'm wondering if these Hotels are mainly Bed and Breakfast ones and only open their restaurant on 6 evenings a week ?

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Thinking about it, stayed in a hotel in Val D that had a night without food, so maybe not so unusual

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@albob,
Hotel Heitzmann no evening meal Tuesday
Boutique Hotel TwoTimez no evening meal Tuesday (all meals taken in the Heitzmann)
Hotel Zum Hirschen no evening meal Sunday (restaurant closed)
Hotel Central no evening meal Tuesday

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Not just Zell am See.
Hotel Post, Bad Gastein, no evening meal Wednesday.
Hotel la Vieille Ferme, Villeneuve, Serre Chevalier, no evening meal saturday.

I’ve never stayed HB with a forced night off – that was always the realm of chalet catering, hotels just swap shifts. Might be cost cutting. That’s a bit cheeky for the one not feeding guests on a Sunday though, as there’s not likely to be many other options for them due to lots of Austrian restaurants closing on Sunday evenings.

You know it makes sense.

@Scarlet, closed on Sunday in a ski resort? All my local restaurants are open in winter

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

@holidayloverxx, yep, though it was Easter Sunday in Mayrhofen the last time it was problematic, so maybe it was that as well. Lots closed in Innsbruck on a Sunday evening too.

A snowHead

I experienced similar with Inghams in Lech a few years ago.

A snowHead

We stayed in one of these years ago in Obertauern basically, it's a Crystal run chalet operation situated in a hotel they have leased for the season.

It worked ok, although the food and booze weren't up to the normal hotel standard, and a British sauna.

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My memory may be a bit hazy, but didn't Inghams look to introduce this in some of their hotels a year or so ago but then reversed their decision presumably because of the customer backlash?

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This all stems back to the catered chalet idea so beloved of British ski holiday operators. The basic model with just one person doing all the work in a chalet required that they had one evening off per week. As the market grew, and particularly in the UK became more of a mass appeal/low cost thing, operators looked around to find rundown hotels now no longer able to attract a proper hotel clientele, which they would buy up and operate as a chalet-hotel. As such they had a market that were most used to the chalet girl's day off and said operators used that as a way of keeping costs down by following suit.

Fast forward twenty years and we find some of the larger operators continuing to operate on the chalet-hotel model, with fixed occupancy times, i.e. Saturday to Saturday only, half board as a default, and making the guests eat out once a week, usually on the Wednesday. Some guests say they actually prefer this as it gives them a chance to get out and see the town at least once, and the operators will point to this as their rationale even though it's clearly simply a cost-saving measure.

I've only ever seen this model used by these British tour operators so I imagine it's going to be found anywhere they operate.

Bottom line: a chalet-hotel is not a hotel.

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So it basically comes down to how "exclusive" the hotel is to the TO? I wasn't aware that there were that many hotels exclusively leased by UK TOs anymore ( but I guess TUI encompasses a lot of the northern European market so they don't necessarily need to be UK exclusive.

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In Serre Che, we've seen, since covid & Brexit the whole hotel/chalet business model change.

Tour Ops no longer have Chalets so use local Hotels, and some of the hotels that pre covid had restaurants now no longer do, and if those hotels are used by TO's then they have an arrangement with local restaurants which then handle the catering side.

And I know questions regarding this have been on SH's before.

It has actually had a negative effect, in that we're not not too happy going to those restaurants for a pero, as they resemble a school dining room as they cram in the punters at 19:00 in an effort to keep the restaurant side of it still a bit more elite as it were, but we've also noticed that the normal restaurant food suffers.

It's great for the restaurant as they have guaranteed business out of High Season but like I say we're now not too happy going there, at least early on.

The whole mid-week night off still happens as well, which is good for other restos.

That all said, one hotel used by TUI* in Serre is the excellent Vielle Ferme and they cater all week, and the food is so good, they actually have a separate restaurant away from the regular clientele staying there.

*About 80% Scandi and 20% UK clients

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Austria - Ruhetag…. Laughing

After all it is free

Are the British TOs trying to keep the headline price down by cutting out a meal?

Looking at some of the hotels mentioned, none their own websites appear to mention that the restaurant is closed one night a week. A few years ago I stayed in Zell am See on a package from one of the TOs which was not quite what I had expected. The accommodation was not in the main hotel with a beautiful view over the lake as shown in the brochure, but in an annex round the corner with a panoramic view of the railway line (and accompanying noise most of the night). On the first night we ate an excellent meal in the main restaurant, but on the subsequent nights were shunted off to another dining room with a very different menu (I put my first night experience down to an error on the part of the staff, who perhaps assumed that as I spoke in German/Bavarian, I was not a TO guest).

As for restaurants (i.e. independent restaurants not attached to hotels) closing one night a week in the ski season, post-Covid this is very much a thing. Staff shortages mean that they cannot cover a 7-day operation and employees have the right to at least one day off. Last winter some of the popular restaurants in Saalbach were closed one night a week, as was Bobby's Bar, and the excellent Westernstadl restaurant up on the mountain didn't open at all.

The cases I've seen in Zell am See, as far as I can tell, are not TO run places or chalet hotels. TUI Blue is a range of their own hotels, they cater all seven nights. The Heitzmann hotel website prices are for B&B basis price. The Zum Hirschen website states that the restaurant is closed Sunday.

Thinking about this, it might be staffing issues. The New Post Hotel Schladming in 2023 had a notice that they were closed to non guests due to staff shortages.

@Weathercam, the Crystal Ski web page for the Hotel La Vieille Ferme says evening meals for six nights and the restaurant is cosed on Saturdays.

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I have just booked a hotel in Austria, in a lesser known resort and as far as I know it is not on the books of any tour operator (I have checked). The village is definitely not on the books of any UK operators.

H/B for 6 nights a week and a refund given for the night off. This was made clear in the booking email 7 months out from our trip.

So perhaps the above examples in Zell are just rolling the way they want to?

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Not providing an evening meal on a Saturday arrival is a pain. No knowledge of resort, so what restaurants might be suitable. Always a risk of delayed arrival, so you might have to be trying to find somewhere to eat late in the evening.

Might work if changeover day is Sunday, so you eat out on your last night.

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@ecureuil, I'm sure if you email the hotel or tourist information they could advise you on restaurants for the Saturday night. Or you could....y'know....look them up yourself

Any ski resort is going to be able to provide some kind of food on a Saturday night. Non problem.

You know it makes sense.

I am struggling to understand why this is even worthy of discussion? I know it's July and all but still?

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

It is relevant to people who are about to book with Crystal in the next couple of weeks ; Crystal haven't highlighted the reduction in meals

I expect a chalet/chalet hotel holiday to have a day off for the Hosts, not normal 'Hotel' to only serve dinner on 6 days

A snowHead

To be fair Crystal have noted the number if evening meals on each hotels page, but it would be easy to miss if you didn't fully read all the information.

A snowHead

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

Having been delayed in France on a Saturday before, long past the closing time of a restaurant, we were glad of the food provided in our chalet. It was after 10.30 pm by the time we rocked up and you'd be lucky to find a takeaway pizza at that time of night in a smaller resort. Saturday is a very odd night not to provide food if it is the first night of a holiday. I'm sure Vielle Ferme doesn't close on Saturday evenings, but their dining room for hotel guests on 1/2 board might.

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@Hells Bells, Crystal flights to Serre are on a Sunday - so guests have all week to find an alternative

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@albob, yep, I'd forgotten about that, not sure how, but I had.

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Thing is about the Vielle Ferme, and I knew Magnus the ex-manager well, as I alluded to the vast % of clients are Swedes, and believe it or not, they're transferred from Geneva, and more often than not arrive in the early hours of Sunday morning, so no need for a meal on Saturday evening Laughing

The Rotisserie there with a new chef and management this past season, was nowhere near what is was under Magnus.

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The 6 evening meal format does seem to be increasing in Austria, albeit still not that common, amongst privately run hotels such as The Monzabon in Lech and a few in Zell am See together with other resorts. The UK and Scandi run hotels will often run a 6 night HB package too but then again many are 7 nights (such as VIP from memory). The devil is in the detail I guess, but T.O.s, travel agents and hoteliers have a duty to report this in their descriptions. Interestingly, many high end catered chalets are run on 5 nights evening meals but then some are 6 and some 7...just as an aside.

After all it is free

The restaurant in the Post Hotel in Bad Gastein was closed on Wednesday, not a British TO thing. We went to the Salzburgerhof for fondue. Same owners as Post.

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TUI Crystal Ski : some HB hotels only 6 nights evening meals

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